


Miss Murder

by uhuraprime



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Cold Feet, F/F, M/M, Multi, POV Female Character, Thoughts of infidelity
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-03-07
Updated: 2013-03-13
Packaged: 2017-12-04 13:20:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,474
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/711194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/uhuraprime/pseuds/uhuraprime
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pepper loved Tony, but she loved herself too. And she couldn’t handle this (Otherwise known as the one where Natasha thinks Starbucks fixes everything, and Pepper's an idiot for way longer than she's willing to admit).</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Starbucks and Spandex

Pepper Potts sat at her desk, rubbing her temples in an attempt to calm her throbbing headache. She’d always been good at handling stress, but Tony Stark wasn’t just stress. He was a full-blown whirlwind of insanity. He was also going to be her husband in less than three weeks, and she'd barely started the wedding plans.

Apparently, Pepper was a masochist.

It wasn’t that Pepper didn’t love Tony. Because she did. She really, _really_ did. She loved him for all his faults – and there were a lot of them. She loved his sense of humor. She loved how he could make everything better, even if he really didn’t make it better. Tony had a way of mentally shoving Pepper’s problems under the bed to forget about for a little while, and she loved that.

She loved him.

Pepper _really_ loved him.

A whole lot. Pepper loved Tony so much.

She ran a hand through her pin-straight hair, groaning when she brought it around to her face and saw how much had fallen out with a simple brush. It’d been years since the stress had affected her this much.

Pepper loved Tony, but she loved herself too. And she couldn’t handle this.

The sound of a gentle knock on her door brought Pepper out of her daze and she quickly brushed the hair off of her hands, attempting haphazardly to make everything look halfway presentable. “Who is it?” she called, trying her hardest not to sound agitated.

“Natasha Romanov,” was the reply, and Pepper wanted to die.

“Come in,” Pepper called with a sigh, leaning back on her seat to watch as the red haired woman sauntered into her office. Natasha always moved with grace, her hips swishing as she walked. Pepper vaguely remembered reading something about years of ballet training in her resume, but then again who’s to say the whole thing wasn’t a lie?

Natasha offered a pitiful smile at Pepper’s state and slid a cup of Starbucks coffee across the table with a perfectly manicured hand. “I brought a peace offering.”

It wasn’t that Pepper didn’t like Natasha. The woman was nice enough, and she knew how to hold her own in a male-dominated work environment. She was polite and mature, and back when she’d worked at Stark Industries she’d handled Tony almost just as well as Pepper could. But Pepper didn’t like liars, and Natasha had lied to her face dozens of times. Pepper didn’t give a crap how many worlds she was trying to save while doing it. She’d betrayed both Pepper’s and Tony’s trust, and that wasn’t something a simple cup of coffee could fix.

Pepper tapped her fingers on the white Styrofoam of the cup, turning it so she could read the red Sharpie writing on the side. Decaf... Syrup... milk...

“How’d you know how I like my coffee?” Pepper muttered, taking the cup in her hand and smelling the contents suspiciously.

Natasha shrugged, offering a neutral smile. “I pay attention.”

“This isn’t, like, drugged or anything, right?” Pepper asked, only half kidding.

“Believe me, Miss Potts. If I wanted to get information out of you, I wouldn’t need chemical assistance.”

Pepper raised an eyebrow, drumming her fingers on her desk as she stared up at the other woman. She surmised that maybe these attempts at scaring people into submission worked with the men in her workplace, but Pepper wasn’t scared of anyone who wore that much spandex. “So what brings you here, Natasha?”

“Like I said: peace offering,” Natasha said, pushing off the desk and turning to leave. Pepper’s eyes trailed to the other woman’s ass as she swished her hips back and forth, and her face heated immediately. _It’s just a nice butt_ , she assured herself. _Tony does it all the time._

“Oh, and Miss Potts?” Natasha said, turning back to face Pepper, already halfway out the door.

“Yes, Natasha?”

“If you’re really that unhappy, you might want to tell him.”

And then she was gone, and Pepper was left to wonder what the hell just happened. She took a long swig of her coffee, ignoring the way it burnt her tongue, and heaved a heavy sigh. Was everyone's life this difficult?


	2. An Honest Proposal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More Starbucks, because apparently that's how Natasha makes friends.

Pepper Potts mindlessly stirred her tea with a spoon she’s stolen from the staff room, breathing in deeply to savor the scent. She’d barely slept the night before, and during the small time when she had, she’d dreamt that Tony left her for another woman. She applied pressure to her shoulder blades in an attempt to get rid of the knots that rested there, and jumped a bit at the email notification coming from her new Starkphone.

“I’ll have to ask Tony if there’s some way to turn that off,” she muttered, unlocking her phone and opening her email. She raised an eyebrow when she read the name of the sender (“Natasha Romanov,” it read), but she opened it regardless.

‘Pepper, Coffee. Noon. Meet me at Starbucks. \- Natasha.’

Pepper raised an eyebrow. She’d half a mind to reply with a snarky comment about how, in this day and age, a woman should at least be presented with some sort of choice. She decided she’d probably be preaching to the choir on that one, so instead she typed a passive ‘See you then,’ and got back to work.

\---

Pepper and Natasha arrived at the same time, both getting out of their respected vehicles and sharing an awkward laugh at the coincidence. They walked together in stride, Natasha holding the door open for Pepper as they both entered the coffee shop.

“You know,” Pepper said conversationally, forgetting for a moment that she was supposed to hate this woman. “I think Tony would kill me if he saw me here with you.”

“Why?” Natasha said, face expressionless as she looked up at Pepper.

“Well, first of all, he hates this place. Apparently the kids who come here aren’t his cup of tea... or, uh, coffee, I guess,” she said with a smile. The girl in line ahead of them turned around with a scowl. The tips of her platinum blonde hair were dyed an obnoxious shade of pink, and she was wearing clothes 3 sizes too big for her tiny body. Beside Pepper, Natasha snorted.

“Yeah, I believe the term is ‘hipsters.’ I can’t say I’m not surprised, though. With what the new Starkphone is going for on the market, you’d think Tony’d be all for overpriced crap.”

Pepper hummed, eyes following the pink haired girl as she went to join her equally ridiculous looking friends. “You never know with Tony.”

After the two of them had ordered their drinks they picked a table far away from the ‘hipsters’ and sat down across from each other.

“May I ask why you wanted to meet me here?” Pepper asked, taking a sip of her drink and scowling at the way it burnt her tongue.

“Just to talk,” Natasha said, sipping her own drink. She looked strangely unfazed by the intense heat, but then again Natasha had always been kind of weird and mysterious. “I think we got off on the wrong foot, and I’d like to mend our relationship.”

“What makes you think _I_ want to mend it?”

Natasha smiled (if that’s what you’d call it, it was really just a small twitch of the lips) and leaned back in her seat. “I never said you did. Doesn’t mean you never will.”

Pepper frowned, crossing her arms across her chest. She gave Natasha a long, hard stare. She couldn’t figure this woman out. She acted so passive all the time, and yet manage to make everything she said have feeling. Simply being in the same room with her gave Pepper a headache. “So you dragged me all the way here to ‘mend our relationship?’ That’s it?”

“No.”

Pepper gestured for Natasha to go on. “Humor me, then.”

“Well, Tony’s been talking to the team about having us move into Stark Tower. I’m sure you’ve seen the plans already.”

“What? No. I haven’t. Are you sure he was serious?”

“Well... yes. He has floorplans and everything. I – I thought you would’ve been the first person he consulted.”

“Well, he didn’t.”

Natasha’s eyebrows creased and her normally emotionless face filled with something Pepper didn't recognize. Pepper thought maybe she’d initiated a staring contest, but then she spoke again. “Well, anyway, I just wanted to ask you first if you’d be okay with me moving in when it’s done. Like I said, we’re not on the best terms. I don’t want to live in a place where there’s constant tension. It may affect my work.”

That was the thing about Natasha. Everything was about her work. Granted, Pepper was a pretty huge workaholic herself, but she had her priorities straight. This woman? Not so much. “I won’t be catty, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“I’m not asking if you’ll be catty. I’m asking if you’ll be _comfortable._ If you’ll be happy. It’s your home, not mine. I’m not willing to live somewhere I’m not one hundred percent welcome.”

Pepper shrugged. “Don’t worry about it, Natasha.”

For the rest of the day Pepper couldn’t get the fact that Tony had kept these plans from her out of her head.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All right, this one's just to get the plot going, I guess. Next chapter will be from Natasha's POV (hopefully)!


	3. Bad Timing and a Game of Cards

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Avengers (minus Tony) play go fish at Bruce's apartment, and Natasha's got a job to do.

“Hey Nat, you got any fours?” Clint said, voice muffled a bit by the cards he literally had _pressed against his face_ so Thor wouldn’t peek (not that that stopped the guy from trying, the clueless bastard).

Natasha fingered through her hand for a moment before shaking her head and pressing her lips together to form a tiny smirk. “Go fish, Barton.”

Clint sighed, reaching for the deck. He kept the card face down and dragged it all the way up his body, shoving it into the hand without even bothering to check what it was. Natasha rolled her eyes and turned towards Steve to see what his next move would be, but the blonde was somewhere else. His blue eyes were distant as they stared at the wall opposite them. His cards were nearly crumpled in his tight grip, and he looked about ready to explode.

“Your turn, Steve,” Bruce said patiently. 

Steve’s eyes refocused at the sound of his name and he turned his attention back to the people around him, face wrinkled in confusion. “ _Wha_...? Oh. My turn? Sorry. Thor, you got any, uh, sixes?”

“Go fish, good Captain,” Thor said, with a wide smile. Natasha rolled her eyes. She could see Thor’s hand, and he did indeed have three sixes. She decided to let it go, though, considering these games made the guy so damn happy. Apparently the god of fertility also enjoyed playing go fish with his team, even with the extremely hot and totally-in-love-with-him girlfriend he had waiting for him back in New Mexico. The only thing that could’ve made that smile brighter would’ve been if Tony had bothered to show up (or maybe a good victory on the battlefield, but then again that’d make any of the Avengers smile).

“Where’s Tony?” Natasha murmured curiously as her eyes scanned her cards.

“Last I heard he was with Steve,” Bruce said, and when Natasha’s gaze flickered up she saw him staring at the blonde in question. “Did he mention why he cancelled while you two were out today?”

Steve shifted uncomfortably in his place on the ground and shrugged, although he didn’t look very uncertain at all. “Didn’t come up, I guess,” he said, and from the look Clint was giving her, Natasha knew she’d have to be the one to get it out of him.

_Later,_ she mouthed to the archer, turning her attention onto Bruce. “Banner, you got any aces?”

\---

The game finished about ten minutes later. Natasha won (obviously), and Thor came in close second. Steve lost, which Clint was positively _overjoyed_ about. But it was only because the soldier had his mind anywhere but in the game (Natasha knew for a fact that Rogers was kickass at card games; he’d had had a lot of downtime between missions, back in the war), and it was her job to figure out what it was that’d been bugging the guy. _Lucky me,_ she thought with a snort. Steve Rogers wasn’t exactly the kind of guy to spill his guts to just anyone. It wasn’t that Natasha couldn’t do it -- she could get information out of anyone -- but it’d be a challenge. Normally Natasha liked challenges, but she wasn’t getting paid for this one.

Natasha waited patiently to make her move. Her eyes followed Steve as he sat next to Bruce on the couch, quickly getting bored with whatever cheesy Discovery Channel show he was watching, then searched the room for Thor only to find the guy was already upstairs (having phone sex with Darcy, no doubt, but Steve probably assumed he was just sleeping). It wasn’t until he made his way toward the kitchen that she pounced.

“Hey, Steve,” Natasha hummed as she entered the kitchen, where the soldier was pouring himself a glass of lemonade.

“Good Evening, ma’am.”

Natasha eyed Steve for a moment, formulating a reply in her mind. Steve hadn’t always treated Natasha as his equal. In the first few weeks they’d known each other it was like he was stepping on eggshells. He’d pass her in the hallway at SHIELD HQ and avoid all eye contact, head bowed to the ground, face flushed. It was like he was scared of her. When they talked, he always avoided words like ‘woman’ and ‘feminine and ‘girly,’ often stopping in the middle of his sentences to catch himself before he said something sexist. Natasha knew she shouldn’t blame him for being brought up that way. He was raised in a different era after all. But, the way Natasha sees it, sexism is still sexism no matter whether or not it’s socially accepted at the time. Long story short, she convinced Steve to spar with her in the SHIELD training facility. He tried to take it easy on her. She had him pinned in three moves. After that Steve never questioned her abilities again.

Still, Natasha thought maybe she could take a kind of Southern Belle approach. Show Rogers a different side of her. A gentle one, like the kind of woman he’d been brought up around. Maybe then he’d open up to her, like he would to a mother or a sister.

“Ma'am? Aw, Steve, I’m not _that_ old,” she said with a smile, pronouncing each word carefully and rhythmically. “You can call me Natasha.”

Steve scratched the back of his neck, eyes anywhere but Natasha. Not this again, she thought, but forced another kind smile. “I – I thought –“ Steve started, but she cut him off.

“Well you thought wrong, Steve. Now tell me what’s got you all tied up before I explode from the suspense.” Natasha pursed he red lips, attempting to appear interested. From the look on Steve’s face, it was working.

“I really shouldn’t,” he said. “You’re probably tired and it’s not like it’s very interesting or anything –”

Natasha grinned, shaking her head and running a hand through her thick red hair. “Nonsense! I’m all ears, Steve, just –” She was cut off by the sound of her phone ringing. She checked the caller ID, frowning slightly upon reading it. Why would Pepper Potts be calling her at this hour? Or at all, really? “Just give me a second, Steve,” she said sweetly, squeezing the man’s shoulder, before she left the kitchen with an internal groan.

Natasha had half a mind to ignore Pepper’s call. The woman had been nothing but trouble for her since she’d started trying to get on her good side. None of her approaches were working. If Pepper wasn’t such an important ally she would’ve given up days ago. Pepper Potts could be a royal pain in the ass when she wanted to, and oh did she want to.

“Hello?” Natasha said sweetly into the phone, clearing her throat when she noticed she was still using the act she’d been trying to pull on Steve. “Sorry, uh, Pepper?”

There was a sniffle on the other line, and Natasha’s brow creased. “Miss Potts?”

“Natasha,” Pepper said, voice cracking as she spoke. “Can you pick me up? Tony and I had a fight."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Natasha's POV! Yay! This the longest chapter I've written yet, I think. Hope you enjoyed! Sorry for the (kind of) cliffhanger, but I'm actually not sorry at all


	4. Trouble In Paradise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Natasha's babysitting (except, you're not exactly supposed to be experience sexual tension with your client, are you?).

Natasha was fast. She grew up fast. Everything she did was fast. Still, as she drove Bruce’s car to the bus stop, she felt like she wasn’t moving fast _enough._ She had to get to Pepper. This had to go right.

She hadn’t cared this much about a job in years. It wasn’t that she needed Pepper as an ally. The woman was no longer her only link to Tony Stark, after all. It was that she _wanted_ Pepper as an ally. She wanted to get on this woman’s good side. She wanted to have someone to call when Tony was being self-destructive, and she didn’t want to lose the little trust Tony had in her simply because she couldn’t get along with his soon-to-be wife.

Wife. How weird. Who ever thought Tony Stark would get married? Natasha ignored the feeling she got in her chest at the thought of it. This was one thing Tony couldn’t afford to mess up. Hopefully he hadn’t already.

As she rounded the corner, she saw Pepper's hunched form standing at the bus stop. It was pouring rain, and the woman didn’t even have an umbrella. Natasha pulled over, ignoring her bad parking job, and ran toward Pepper as fast as she could. “Pepper!” she shouted.

“Natasha?”

Natasha stopped once she reached the other woman, taking in her thin, shivering form. “You’re going to catch a cold out here,” she muttered, grabbing Pepper’s wrist and practically dragging her towards Bruce’s Toyota. She resisted the urge to wrap her arms around Pepper to get her warm. As helpful as it would be, it was unprofessional. And from experience Natasha knew most people under as much stress as Pepper was didn't appreciate unwanted touches. “You got a change of clothes?”

She took the silence that followed as a no.

“No? Okay. I think Bruce might have a t-shirt or something in the back, and I can lend you something once we get to SHIELD.”

Pepper turned towards Natasha, eyes wide. “SHIELD?”

“Well, yeah,” Natasha said, opening Pepper’s door for her and helping the other woman in. “That’s where I live.”

“I know, but...” Natasha shut the door and ran to the other side, sliding into the front seat and facing Pepper.

“But what? It’s not like you have anywhere else to go. And you called me.”

Pepper shrugged, settling into her seat and staring out the window. Natasha eyed her as she started up the car, wondering what the hell could’ve happened that Pepper had ended up alone, in the street, on a night like this.

“Do you want to talk about it?” she asked as she backed out of her spot.

“Not really.”

And for the first time in a long time, Natasha didn’t try to trick someone into giving her the information she wanted.

\---

“These should fit you,” Natasha mumbled, shoving a t-shirt and sweats at Pepper. “I can get some of the interns to buy you some stuff at Walmart tomorrow, if you need it.”

Pepper nodded, taking the clothes from Natasha. “Thanks,” she breathed, looking around the room. “Is there a bathroom around here?”

“There’s one down the hall by Clint’s room but you probably shouldn’t use that one. You’re not exactly supposed to be here, and Tony’s got cameras everywhere, the snooping bastard. I won’t look,” she said, pretending to be interested in her perfectly filed nails. “Or I can leave.”

“No it’s fine, I’ll just...” Pepper tugged at the end of her t-shirt and Natasha quickly averted her eyes, trying to give the woman some privacy.

Natasha had always been attracted to women. She'd had several crushes on other girls as a kid. She'd even ‘dated’ a girl in her ballet class when she was thirteen, and had later been threatened to be kicked out of the class when her teacher found out. She remembered her first kiss. Sally, the girl was called. She remembered being sixteen years old and punching an agent in the face for calling another agent a dyke. She remembered crying into Clint’s shirt when France legalized equal marriage. It was just a fact. Natasha liked women. And, composed a person as she was, it was kind of hard for her to control herself when there was a woman undressing in her bedroom. Luckily, though, she'd had years of practice. Pepper barely seemed to notice the way she was dying inside.

“So what do you do for fun around here?” Pepper asked as she stepped into Natasha’s sweats.

Natasha shrugged, gesturing around the room. “Not much to do, really. I usually spar with Clint or Steve, sometimes read a book or two.”

"You spar with _men_? Aren't you scared they'll hurt you?"

"Miss Potts, I'm appalled that you'd be so close-minded," Natasha said with a snort. "If anything, they should be scared of me. I don't have any stupid gender roles or male guilt holding me back."

Pepper frowned, looking at Natasha curiously. Like she was a puzzle piece that just wouldn't fit. "But they're stronger than you."

Natasha shrugged. "Of course they are. I'm not built for strength anyway, female or not. But fighting's about a lot more than how hard you can punch.

"It is?"

Natasha smiled, stepping toward her overflowing bookshelf and running a finger over the spine of Pride and Prejudice. “Have you seen your fiancé lately?” she mused. “The guy’s not exactly built for battle, is he?”

Pepper huffed, brushing some stray hair behind her ear. “Can we not talk about Tony?”

“Sorry,” Natasha said with a shrug. “Did you have dinner?”

Pepper nodded, stepping towards Natasha and pressing up close to her side as she reached over to take a peek at the shelf. “Harry Potter?”

“All seven of them,” Natasha said proudly. “In Russian.”

“I forget you’re Russian sometimes,” Pepper admitted. “Is it weird to speak English all the time?”

“Я не замечаю. Русские по-прежнему является лучшей языка.”

“What?”

“Don’t worry about it.”

Pepper sighed, rolling her eyes and straightening herself so that she and Natasha were face-to-face, noses almost touching. For a moment the two of them just stared into each others’ eyes, Natasha memorizing the exact shade of blue reflecting back at her, and then Pepper cleared her throat awkwardly and pulled away. “Where exactly am I sleeping?” she asked, eyeing the twin-sized cot in the center of Natasha’s room.

“You can take the cot,” Natasha assured her, making sure to keep her voice passive. “I’ll make myself a bed on the floor.”

“You sure? I don’t want to, like, steal your bed. It’s not like you were planning on having me here and I’ve already been enough of a –“

“Pepper,” Natasha cut her off, giving Pepper a stern look. “You’re my guest. Though I have to warn you, it’s quite squeaky.”

The other woman nodded, eyeing the bed with a weary look in her eyes, and Natasha snorted. “Get into bed, Pepper,” she mused. “I’m going to go see if I can find some extra bedding in one of the storage rooms.”

“All right,” Pepper said, climbing into the bed slowly. “Um, if I’m asleep by the time you get back, just... thank you, Natasha.”

“Don’t worry about it, Pepper.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i hate this chapter don't touch me omfg


	5. Publicity Stunts and Tears

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pepper's more upset about the fight than she's willing to let on, and Tony? Well, Tony's being an asshole about it.

Natasha couldn’t sleep. She tossed and turned in the bed she’d made on the ground, searching for the cold side under the pillow with one hand, but it was no use. She couldn’t get comfortable. You would think, after years of jobs in strange countries, she’d learn to adapt. But no. Natasha was a creature of habit once she stayed around long enough to form a few. She couldn’t sleep outside of her bed, but she wasn’t about to kick Pepper out of it.

She sat up in bed, reaching for her cell phone to call Clint, and that’s when she heard the sniffling. It was a quiet, pathetic noise. The kind you make when you’re trying to hold your sadness in. Natasha had heard it millions of times before, during training and missions and sometimes through the door of a bedroom, as some poor agent struggled with his or herself. Never in a million years did she think she’d hear that kind of noise from Pepper Potts.

“Pepper?” she breathed, standing up on her makeshift bed, and leaning over to look at the woman.

Pepper opened her mouth to speak but instead let out a loud sob, curling in on herself. “I’m s-s-sorry, Tasha. I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Natasha murmured as she crawled into bed with Pepper and gathered the other woman into her arms. “I wasn’t sleeping anyway.”

“What are you –”

“Shh,” Natasha murmured, pressing her lips to Pepper’s forehead. “ _Все будет хорошо_.”

Pepper whimpered helplessly and leaned into Natasha for comfort. Natasha studied the other woman’s face and saw the way Pepper, so young, had aged. “He works me so hard.”

“I know, _dorogaya_ ,” Natasha breathed, pulling Pepper into her chest and rocking her back and forth slowly."'M sorry."

_It’s just for the case_ , Natasha assured herself as she rocked Pepper in her arms and sang Russian lullabies in her ear. _Just to get on her good side._

“I love him so much, Natasha, but I can’t keep doing this.”

“Go to sleep Pepper. We can talk about it in the morning.” Natasha stroked the other woman's hair, running her fingers along her back soothingly.

And, for once, Pepper Potts actually listened to Natasha’s instructions. Or maybe she was just tired.

\---

Natasha awoke to find Pepper in her arms. The woman was pressed into her chest, face now dry of the tears that had streamed down her cheeks the night before. She gently removed herself from Pepper’s grip. Quickly, she changed into a pair of jeans and a t-shirt, messing her short, red hair with her hands before leaving the room to find Clint.

She knocked on his door once, heard rustling, and rolled her eyes in amusement. “Nothing I haven’t seen before, boys,” she murmured.

The door opened after a moment and Clint stood there, a bit disgruntled and hair sticking everywhere. “Is there something you need, Natasha?”

Natasha leaned over her friend to get a better view of the man lying in his bed nonchalantly. “Hey Phil,” she mused, offering a wave to Coulson before stepping back to face Clint. “Sorry to interrupt, but I’ve got Pepper Potts in my room and she’s a complete mess so –“

“You fucked Pepper? Damn Nat, I didn’t think you had it in you.”

“No, I didn’t _fuck_ her.”

Clint rolled his eyes. “Oh, sorry. _Made love_.”

“No, she didn’t – dammit, Clint, she’s _engaged_. To Tony Stark. Did you forget that? And they had a big fight last night so I let her crash here. Can you just make sure she doesn’t wander off?” Natasha asked with a sigh.

“Yeah, sure, Tasha,” Clint said, squeezing her shoulder. “Hope you do tap that, eventually. Maybe you can even pull that giant stick out of her ass while you’re at it.”

Natasha kicked the back of Clint’s ankles, taking him off-guard and sending him ass-first onto the ground. “Shut the fuck up, Barton,” she said affectionately as she gave Coulson a salute and made her way down the hallway toward the parking lot.

Natasha had never been very good with feelings. Sure, she knew how to calm someone down when they were having a panic attack. She knew the exact words to use when talking someone out of suicide. She knew how to manipulate people to get on their good side, but those were all routines. Moves she had perfected, just like the one she had preformed on Clint. She was putting on an act. The real Natasha didn’t know shit about feelings, so she used Starbucks.

She thought about stealing one of the cars to drive there. She knew it’d go unnoticed. But it was a nice day, and the store was just a few blocks away. Plus, it meant more time before she had to confront Pepper again and deal with feelings (that sounded a lot less fucked up in Natasha’s head).

She walked down the street, putting her hands in the pockets of what she now knew were a pair of Clint’s jeans, not hers (it was pretty easy to figure out, considering the pockets were actually big enough to fit something besides spare change). The sun warmed her skin. She felt at home.

Natasha hummed the tune of a song she’d learned in France as she walked. She’d forgotten most of the words, but it didn’t matter. The song was beautiful, and it reminded her of good times. When she finally rounded the corner toward the coffee shop, her heart stopped.

Of all the places in this dumb city, Tony Stark had to choose _her_ Starbucks to pull a publicity stunt?

Despite how angry she was at the man, she clenched her fists together and made her way towards the door of the coffee shop, pushing through the sea of photographers until her hands felt the cool glass of the door, and she pulled. Before she entered the shop she heard a confused, “Natasha?” but she didn’t have time to deal with Tony Stark. She thought he'd hated this place, anyway.

She waved her hello to Madison, as she entered the shop, making her way to her regular seat.

“The usual, Natasha?” Madison called as she handed another customer his iced coffee.

“Make it double. I’ve got company,” Natasha said with a smile.

“Shoot,” Madison said, her blonde ponytail swishing from side to side as she mixed the drinks. “I was hoping we could get some alone time today, but if you’re too busy...”

“You know I’m always willing to make time for you, Madison,” Natasha said with chuckle. “But not today. It’s a bit of an emergency.”

Madison was her friend. Had been since she started coming to this Starbucks, right around the time she’d started working at Stark Industries. The two of them fooled around from time to time, but they were friends first. There had been about an eight month period where Madison was dating some guy – what was his name? Heath? Henry? – and they hadn’t done anything at all to affect their friendship. The sex was great, but it wasn’t the only thing they had going between them.

When Madison set two drinks in front of Natasha, the redhead smiled sweetly in thanks. “You’re the best, Mads.”

“I know I am,” Madison murmured, leaning close to Natasha’s ear. “You sure you don’t have time for a quickie in the bathroom stall? I’m on my break in five.”

“Not today, sorry,” Natasha said with an apologetic smile, handing the blonde a few bills. “I gotta get going before these get cold.”

The booming sound of Tony Stark’s laughter had Madison pulling away from Natasha, frowning slightly as the slew of photographers followed him into her shop. “I’ll have whatever she’s having,” he said, gesturing to Natasha.

The redhead was fuming. How cold Tony act so calm, after the state he’d left Pepper in? Didn’t he care where she was? She grabbed her drinks and made her way toward the door, pushing through the photographers again with an exasperated sigh.

“What’s the rush, Tasha?” Tony said, voice laced with a pinch of what Natasha detected sincere worry as he did.

Natasha rolled her eyes, pushing through the photographers again and walking right into Tony’s space. “You are _scum,_ Tony Stark. The lowest of the low. You’re too self-centered to even go out looking for your fiancé, after you let her stand out in the rain for an hour last night. She could’ve gotten pneumonia. She could be _dead_ , for all you know. She could’ve been hit by a car or attacked by a stranger in the street. Yet here you are, with your little entourage of photographers, while I buy your fiancé coffee and try to get her mind off of your sorry ass. What’s the _rush_ , Tony? I’d much rather be spending time with a woman who can barely stand me than be with your sorry ass, and that should tell you something about your character.” Natasha turned on her heel and left the shop without another word. It was only when she’d rounded the corner back to SHIELD that she realized there had been paparazzi all round the shop to hear her rant.

“ _Да поможет мне Бог_ ,” she muttered, for once thankful that her bedroom didn’t have a television.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay guys so I know Tony's been painted as a heartless asshole in this chapter, but I can assure you there is a reason for that! Tony lovers, don't get discouraged. I'm not going to make him into the big bad villain like some people do to Pepper when Tony's in slash pairings.


End file.
